You know the drill. The fashion industry is exclusive, and we’re tired of being told who can and cannot strut down a runway looking like a traffic cone.
There are agencies that represent curvier women such as Muse, and Lorde, Inc is committed to fighting racism in the industry, but we’re still seeing a significant lack of diversity in the industry.
E.I. MODELS has launched a kickstarter and hopes to be the world’s first equal opportunity modeling agency. According to the Kickstarter page, the agency would have an office based out of Atlanta and wants to give anyone who aspires to model a shot at their dreams without the fun discrimination check that happens at most agency doors. According to E.I.’s mission statement, the company focuses “on the model’s talent not their height nor waist size.”
Photographer and modeling coach Elbert Ivory formed E.I. MODELS after he was rejected from several agencies due to his height. It inspired him to “take a dream for himself and instill it within other inspiring models.”
The team has 80 aspiring models already and, from the looks of their promotional video, E.I. seems to be holding up to their promise for different sizes, and we can all take a shot in their honor for that. Bad news is they’ve only raised $157 of their pledged $25,000 goal, and they hope to have an established office by January 2016, so it seems there’s still a ways to go before we start seeing curves in volumes on the runway. Until then, we’ll be over here taking more shots.